HostGator offers a wide range of services, but they’re undoubtedly best known for their well-priced Managed WordPress hosting plans. They offer three shared hosting plans – Hatchling, Baby and Business – and each one steps up the service options and support provision. In addition, HostGator offer reseller plans, VPS hosting and dedicated servers, as well as an affiliate program.

65% Off HostGator Managed WordPress Hosting Plans

HostGator is a private company. The current CEO Brent Oxley formed the company while he was at university in 2002. Now, HostGator host more than 950,000 websites for 400,000 customers in over 200 countries. Originally based in Florida, HostGator’s rapid growth lead them to a move to Texas in 2007. They have a base in Houston and an office in Austin, plus an Indian arm.

HostGator Hosting Plans

HostGator Linux based shared hosting covers three plans. The most basic plan, Hatchling, is a one-domain package with no add-on domains and no anonymous FTP, but it’d be fine for hosting a blog. For more domains, users need to upgrade to Baby or Business. For anonymous FTP, only the Business package will do. Additionally, dedicated IPs are not available on the Hatchling plan. On Baby, they’re chargeable, and on Business, they’re free. Business also includes private SSL (the others are shared) and a toll-free number for you to use as you please. This is only really useful for US customers, or those marketing primarily to customers in the US, although the number can be extended to serve Canada at additional cost.

Business plan: This plan starts at $9.95 per month. It supports 3 site, 300k visits per month, 3GB backups, and unlimited GB of storage.

In addition to shared hosting & managed WordPress plans, HostGator offers few more options. Reseller hosting is split into five plans depending on the disk space, bandwidth and domains that are required. Other than that, the provision on each plan is more or less the same. VPS hosting is split into nine plans. Again, you’ll need to fine-tune your requirements using the interactive price chart to calculate the applicable monthly fee. Dedicated servers are priced according to the resources you need. The pricing is the same for both Windows hosting and Linux hosting, but the software obviously differs depending on the OS. If you want to run Java, you’ll need a VPS or dedicated plan, but Python is installed on all servers. HostGator also offers cloud hosting.

HostGator Uptime/Downtime

That’s right. 100%.

While most hosts brag about their measly ~99% uptime, HostGator’s managed WordPress hosting delivers where it matters most. HostGator rent their data centre space from The Planet, using four of their facilities in Texas. Power back-ups, fire detection and constant monitoring from on-site staff keep their 12,000 servers safe and secure. All accounts (except dedicated servers) are backed up on a weekly basis. If you need to restore a backup, HostGator charge $15, unless you supply the backup file yourself, in which case it’s free.

HostGator powers more than 950,000, and they’re pretty focused about their staff, resources and services. Notably, they don’t allow overselling, so the capacity you’re given is the capacity you’ll actually get. The exception is on a VPS or dedicated server where you’re free to oversell at your own risk.

HostGator Support

HostGator’s support options are pretty comprehensive for a low-cost shared hosting provider. You can access 24/7 live chat support, a FAQ, email support or phone support (within the US, it’s free to call their phone number). It’s not clear where their support staff are based. If you have chosen the pro version among HostGator shared hosting, you will get one dedicated toll free number as well.

HostGator Control Panel

All of HostGator’s Linux plans come with Cpanel 11 as standard, and users are given a variety of themes to choose from. Cpanel provides access to all the features you’ll need, including webmail, one-click backups and DNS settings for Google Apps.

HostGator Extras

The Business shared plan on HostGator includes a free toll-free number for US callers. Optionally, this can be extended to Canadian customers for an additional charge per call. If you cancel your hosting plan, you lose the number, unless you contact HostGator first to take it to a paid service. You’ll also need to receive at least one call per month to keep the line active.

Most packages come with SiteBuilder, SiteStudio, Fantastico (a range of php scripts), OSCommerce, WordPress, Joomla, one-click installs and a host of capable stats packages. On dedicated servers, you can allocate individual SiteBuilder accounts and templates to your clients. HostGator also offer $100 Adwords credit on all shared hosting plans, and reseller accounts receive a free upgrade to an eNom domain reseller account. This requires manual set-up, but it’s a quick and painless process that takes a couple of minutes.

HostGator Money Back Guarantee / Cancellation Policy

You can cancel your shared, reseller or VPS hosting plan within the 45-days and receive a full refund. Dedicated servers are not eligible. Costs incurred, such as admin and installation fees or domain name purchases, are non-refundable.

Cancellation requests need to be sent via a special online form. The account will be cancelled within 48 hours. If you want to claim a refund, you need to reply to the cancellation email and request it – it’s not automatic. Refunds are sent via credit card or PayPal.

Considering the company claim that more than 1% of the planet’s internet traffic flows to and from HostGator’s 12,000 servers, that’s definitely a big achievement. While HostGator’s low pricing is similar to other shared hosting providers, their plans are extremely comprehensive and scalable, making it easy to purchase a small shared plan and upgrade to a higher-spec shared hosting, VPS or dedicated server package over time.

65% Off HostGator Managed WordPress Hosting Plans

Are you a Gator Managed WordPress customer or hosting reseller? Do you have any comments to add about their services? Got questions? If so, feel free to share your experience with our visitors!

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